New gen Honda City Hybrid to launch in Spring 2014

Honda will be unveiling a next generation Honda City Hybrid next year. This was revealed in a speech by Sho Minekawa, Managing Officer and Chief Operating Officer for Regional Sales Operations for Honda at the 2013 Tokyo Motor Show. The City Hybrid will come after the unveiling of the regular engined Honda City by the end of this month in India.

UPDATE:The fourth-gen Honda City has been officially revealed – click here for the report and pics.

The new Honda City will be available with both a regular combustion engine as well as a hybrid powertrain. This would be the City’s natural progression as every other Honda B-segment car based on the same platform as the new City now has a hybrid version – the new Honda Fit/Jazz, the Fit Shuttle, the Honda Freed and most recently the Honda Vezel B-segment SUV.

This new B-segment sedan will be a new entrant for the Japanese market and is set to debut in Spring 2013. That would be sometime in Q2 2014. Honda previously sold the second-generation City as the Fit Aria in Japan, but the third generation currently on sale in Malaysia was never launched. The new Honda City will be launched exclusively with a hybrid engine in Japan.

Honda’s strategy for Japan is for every sedan model to be exclusively available with a hybrid powertrain. This is true for the current generation Accord. However, while this model is confirmed for the Asia Pacific market and will be launched in that region before Japan, some markets will get the hybrid version and others would only get the normal combustion engine car.

If Honda Malaysia moves to launch a Honda City Hybrid in Malaysia, we think the Honda Insight could be discontinued as the two cars seem like they overlap in the same segment.

While most dream of the future, Jonathan Tan dreams of the past, although he's never been there. Fantasises much too often about cruising down Treacher Road (Jalan Sultan Ismail) in a Triumph Stag that actually works, and hopes this stint here will snap him back to present reality.

Yeah , why pity? I have the Insight and my wife the Jazz Hybrid . I like mine better and she likes hers better . I have m y reasons and she has hers too .Her reason is that the Jazz is a cute car . I dont want to drive a cute car , I want a car that was designed as hybrid kammback .Both has its own qualities .Enough said ?

Do you own a Honda or driven one before ? Maybe the toy is in your little mind . I have one and think its a great car to run around . I also have a Beemer 6 series as a different type of fun car . So in comparison to the two types of cars , I know what im talking about .

What ,with the new gen hybrid powertrain? the 1.5l I-VTEC DOCH with the 160Nm elctric motor mated to a 7-speed gearbox? Where Do I Sign Up. Well not sure about reliability, but it should solve one of the problems I have with the City; Among them are the torque-less grunt around city and an Auto with a loooong gearing set-up, you have to keep it revving noisily in S-mode to get the power out.

Hopefully they will ironed out that notorious NVH as well. Well hoping they do launch the hybrid here, but honestly the normal 1.5l VTEC DOCH dosen’t sound half bad, and I have no qualms with Honda’s 5-speed auto, the DOCH should smoother out the harsh engine noise that many dosen’t like with the car. Now I just have to wait for the styling, I am not expecting a looker, but something has to at least on par with the Sungless wearing Mecha it is now.

It’s very cost effective for Honda to fully utilize the B-segment platform and come up with variety of categories like the Jazz hatchback, City sedan, Freed MPV and now the Vezel SUV. As for Proton, what we lack now is the SUV version of Exora/Preve/Suprima.

Insight and City-hybrid might look all most the same, but Insight is hatchback! and looks more sporty. I have been regulary at Honda showroom and most of the time they do not promote Insight and Honda Malaysia also does not give enough show unit as well (Honda Malaysia also not really promoting Insight!). Maybe the margin/incentive from Insight is not attractive as compare to other models. Other comments please

Personally I feel the drive quality and built of the insight is way better then the city, possibly because the city is locally assembled and the insight is complete cbu from Japan. So,for the price you get a better built car in the insight…Just my 2 cents…

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